A billionaire tycoon from China named Long Liyuan died suddenly and mysteriously two days before Christmas. The only clue: a still-steaming bowl of half-eaten cat stew. Could it be? No, it's simply too easy, too dastardly, altogether too meowtrageous! But it's true: The cat stew was poisoned!

Huang Guang, an agriculture official in Bajia, took Long, the owner of a forestry company, to visit a piece of woodland, according to an official police statement. The two men had a troubled history: Huang had allegedly embezzled money from Long. That should have been reason enough for Long to become suspicious of Huang's later invitation to a local restaurant to indulge in a regional delicacy: slow-boiled cat-meat stew.

Hours after gorging himself on feline goulash, Long began complaining of dizziness; he died of cardiac arrest hours later. Police initially detained the restaurant owner for an extreme case of food poisoning, but Long's family urged them to investigate further, and they were right. They now suspect Huang dosed the dish with the poisonous plant Gelsemium elegans.

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The moral here is obvious: Only eat slow-boiled cat-meat when you prepare it yourself. [BBC, Photo via Shutterstock]